Emulating sounds of DX7, D50 with AK?

Elektron Gear Analog Keys/Four
#1

Hi,
I don’t own Analog Keys yet, so I’m curious about AK sound sculpting possibilities to reach the sound territories where mostly synths like Roland D50, Yamaha DX7, Korg Wavestation shines the most - those glassy piano, bellpad atmospheric type of sounds (think of “E-Piano” on DX7, “Fantasia” on D50, Korg Wavestation vocal presets). Also would like to hear what could be done to emulate plucked guitar, slap bass, marimba type of sounds. Is it possible to create something like that?

I’m aware that the synths I mentioned use different sound engine and AK isn’t meant to be FM, PCM type of synth, I’m more interested to know how close AK can go and how does it sound, so If you ever have tried to create something like that or maybe you know some sound banks out there, please share!

#2

If you want those sounds try the Digitone! AK/A4 can do fm but not that kind of Fm, think ak is linear fm.

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#3

Yes, you are right! I somehow skipped the hype when Digitone came out and haven’t checked since then. Almost forgot about it. It really looks tempting.
I’m just having kind of good deal to get AK now, so this made me thinking… since I have been using a lot of D50 and DX7 in my production I’m looking for portable, versatile go-to synth to use in concerts and replicate the sounds I’ve made with those older synths. And there is no way I’m gonna drag around those big boys.

If it boils down to Digitone vs AK then I think that sonically Digitone has a wider sound spectrum - AK is very good at subtractive analogue sound, but can’t do FM style tones, while Digitone is more like jack of all trades. And it has 8 note polyphony!
hmmm

#4

The sounds you are after are definitely in the realm of “digital” rather than analogue.

Remark … on the Digitone … Digitone does not compare to a standard digital FM synthesizer with 4 or more operators. It doesn’t paritularly compare to a DX7. The algorithms and the modulation capability are very reduced. This makes the handling much easier and more fun for the non-FM-synthesist, but many typical DX7 sounds are just not possible.

This said, the DN is worth any cent and is one of the most interesting little boxes to have in the studio. The sound of the Digitone is gorgeous and the operation is easy and much fun :smiley:

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